We do two (non-simultaneous) mini-projects in the first year and a bit before starting our actual thesis project. Current mini-project needs to be wrapped up within the month. But, for the project I'm going to do for my thesis, I need to apply for some telescope time, the deadline for which is September 20th, which means getting up to speed enough to sound really convincing really fast. Also, the deadline for proposals is within a week or two of the deadline for the report regarding my current mini-project. Also also, coursework and TAing start soon. Friig.

Proposal for my Major Research Project is due in 2 weeks and then I have to find my supervisors and then I have to work on it enough to update them twice a month on progress. Also, I need to find the time to get my paperwork so I can get paid by the school for being a TA (Why did I pick school in Canada?).

I'm in the opening stages of researching for a paper on the effects of language contact between Old English and Insular Celtic languages and that is really exciting. One of the great things about postgraduate study is that you can read things that would otherwise mark you as a nerdy nerd. Saying "it's for research" suddenly makes it okay.

_________________Moon - "This is the best recipe in the history of recipes forever."

Stellar streams! Picture a globular cluster (basically a big, densely packed sphere of stars) getting stars torn off of it by tidal forces (like the tides on earth, but with a bunch of stars and they actually escape). They end up forming a pair of long tail-like structures. These aren't smooth though; they're clumpy and riddled with gaps and overdensities caused by a variety of things. One possibility, the one I'm interested in, is that it might come from substructure in the Milky Way's dark matter halo. But, it also might just arise naturally. We need better data!

Stellar streams! Picture a globular cluster (basically a big, densely packed sphere of stars) getting stars torn off of it by tidal forces (like the tides on earth, but with a bunch of stars and they actually escape). They end up forming a pair of long tail-like structures. These aren't smooth though; they're clumpy and riddled with gaps and overdensities caused by a variety of things. One possibility, the one I'm interested in, is that it might come from substructure in the Milky Way's dark matter halo. But, it also might just arise naturally. We need better data!

Yes, that is very cool! I love astronomy, but my brain does not bend the right way to actually comprehend it :-)

This is true of me as well. I really like watching astronomy documentaries, but it's mostly because of all the whooshy graphics and explanation of how big space is. I like how big space is and how it it so big it's actually hard to think about.

I don't understand why poets get all emo about infinity; instead of staring up at beautiful emptiness, you should look around you at the riotous carnival of life that is going on all over the planet. Astronomers have it the right way round; if you're going to stare into the heavens, getting really overexcited is exactly what you should do.

I'm really, really enjoying starting this project I'm doing. Anything involving history and primary sources is cool. You are looking at something that someone wrote down hundreds, or thousands, of years ago. A human mind created wove those words into meaningful sentences and a human hand inscribed them - you're looking at an echo of someone's actions who you can never meet from another culture in another time, and by looking at what they wrote and how they lived, we can get an idea of who they were... it's the nearest we can get to necromancy. Bloody marvellous. Sorry, I'm rambling, but it's only among other nerdy people that I can nerd out fully and not be looked at like I'm barking.

_________________Moon - "This is the best recipe in the history of recipes forever."

Anything involving history and primary sources is cool. You are looking at something that someone wrote down hundreds, or thousands, of years ago. A human mind created wove those words into meaningful sentences and a human hand inscribed them - you're looking at an echo of someone's actions who you can never meet from another culture in another time, and by looking at what they wrote and how they lived, we can get an idea of who they were... it's the nearest we can get to necromancy. Bloody marvellous.

Thank you for reminding me how amazing it actually is! I get bogged down by the enormous mass that is my potential dataset sometimes and forget that I'm not just 'gathering data'. Each and every tiny detail in my data represents a gesture or action performed by a living human being (or other animal) 1500 years ago. My data WILL help me to see what those people were up too, even if doesn't always feel like that when I'm filling the endless list of records in my database.

I'm TAing for this first-year Master's seminar, I have no idea why my prof asked me to do it (my program is big and most people never do TA work) because I feel completely incompetent. I have never taken the course before (it was developed after I went through first-year) and when I was asked, I assumed that I would just be marking papers. No-no, I'm supposed to lead class discussions on the readings and explain all these things I don't have an answer to. And the readings are almost entirely new to me. And I wasn't aware of this until the beginning of the first class. My prof is super-disorganized and gave me a brief overview 20 mins before the class started, and then it went. The class split into 3 groups for the last hour, lead by me, the other TA and my prof. I was able to generate discussion for about 15 minutes using very basic questions, and then there was silence and I couldn't think of what to say and I freaked out and pulled the other TA aside and was like "I don't know what the hell I'm doing". He gave me some ideas and I came back and continued, but I think I lost all credibility with the students. I'm so bad at pretending to be confident and like I know what I'm doing when I don't.

Now I know how the class is going to go and how to prepare for next week, but I'm so scared that one of the students will contact the prof and say that the discussion was completely useless and I am a terrible TA. I really hope nobody does that. Ugh.

I'm TAing for this first-year Master's seminar, I have no idea why my prof asked me to do it (my program is big and most people never do TA work) because I feel completely incompetent. I have never taken the course before (it was developed after I went through first-year) and when I was asked, I assumed that I would just be marking papers. No-no, I'm supposed to lead class discussions on the readings and explain all these things I don't have an answer to. And the readings are almost entirely new to me. And I wasn't aware of this until the beginning of the first class. My prof is super-disorganized and gave me a brief overview 20 mins before the class started, and then it went. The class split into 3 groups for the last hour, lead by me, the other TA and my prof. I was able to generate discussion for about 15 minutes using very basic questions, and then there was silence and I couldn't think of what to say and I freaked out and pulled the other TA aside and was like "I don't know what the hell I'm doing". He gave me some ideas and I came back and continued, but I think I lost all credibility with the students. I'm so bad at pretending to be confident and like I know what I'm doing when I don't.

Now I know how the class is going to go and how to prepare for next week, but I'm so scared that one of the students will contact the prof and say that the discussion was completely useless and I am a terrible TA. I really hope nobody does that. Ugh.

aah, that's the worst! I hope it gets better!

I am having a shitty time trying to incorporate feedback from different committee members. Writing the dissertation is a piece of cake compared to dealing with faculty.

I've just written 500 words on the Northern Subject Rule claiming that this non-standard feature of English is of Celtic influence and my brain will explode soon. I just need to argue against it, then quash that argument by saying basically "Oh, come off it, now you're just being silly" and then get cracking on the "periphrastic do".

On a completely unrelated matter, what do you use to manage your references? I've just started using Zotero and it's tolerable, but I'm sure there are better things available.

_________________Moon - "This is the best recipe in the history of recipes forever."